Well January 10th I picked up my friend Richie and headed to JFK airport on Long Island. We were flying Jetblue down to orlando for our annual pig hunt. Three of my other friends were flying out of islip on Southwest and we touched base with them via cell phone. We were all psyched to get there and try for some pigs and we were a little worried about the cold weather down there. In the past with cold weather the pigs wouldn't move much in the morning but the evening hunts were fine.
We get to JFK and everything goes smooth until we get to the gate. Our flight is delayed since the Flight Attendant just broke her finger. Our 9:30am flight is now an 11:00am flight. Still time to make the evening hunt though. We board at 10:30am and they tell us the bathroom water line is frozen and they are going to fix it. Well an hour goes by and they decide to take off with only one bathroom. Then the engine won't start and they get us off the flight at 1:00pm to see if they can fix. I'm figuring if we can get down to orlando by 4:00pm we can still do a little stalking by the rye fields or stalk up to a feeder maybe. We try to change flights but they tell us the flight is cancelled and we are all on the 4:00pm flight and go to gate 2. At this point all i want to do is get down there and be ready for tomorrow morning. Well we finally get on a 6:00pm flight and make it to orlando at 9:30pm and the ranch at 11:00pm.
We meet up with my other friends and they are really stoked. The hogs are plentiful on the 25,000 acre working cattle ranch. It isa free range fair chase operation where you hunt on feeders, corn thrown on the ground, spot and stalking the fields and property and with dogs sometimes if things are slow. Apparently with the cold weather and only a modest acorn crop the hogs are pretty hungry. The rye grass hasn't come up yet so the hogs are out searching for food early. We are up at 5:00am and ready by 6:00am for the guides to show up. Hoppy ( the owner) and Pat Marino ( from Heritage prints fame ) come in and we catch up a little on the past year.
We are ready to go and the drop me off at a home made ground blind next to a feeder and a swampy area. I've hunted out of a stand at this spot before but the ground blind looks great. It is just a peice of black material set up around chest high. A little high for me being vertically challenged but the shots will be around 15 yards or less if i hold out. Well i hear pigs and see a couple that come into the feeder but I am holding out for them to come over to where the corn is by the ground blind. It is about a 25 yard shot to the feeder and i am not going to take that far a shot on the small killzone of a hog if I don't have to. Unfortunately the wind swirls a little and they are out of there. I'm freezing at this point since it was 29 degrees when we left at 6:15am and now at around 7:30am it is maybe 35 degrees. I had checked weather.com and they called for temps in the low 40's so i didn't bring real warm clothers just a sweatshirt and some regular hunting pants. Thankfully camo wasn't critical so i just put on a bunch of layers under my black muzzy sweatshirt. Pat come by and picks me up at 10:00am and tells me that the guys had some action but nobody had gotten a pig. We grab some breakfast and then we are out back shooting our bows.
I'm shooting a 55lb Pamer single carbon recurve with 55/75 goldtips with 50gr brass inserts and 200gr 2 blade muzzy phantoms. I'm looking forward to see how the extreme FOC arrows work on the hogs. I'm shooting good and the arrows are flying perfect so i am ready to go. At 3:30pm they drop me off at the same ground blind and i settle in for the wait for the feeder to go off at 5:00pm and ring the dinner bell. At around 4:30pm i hear a hog moving in the palmettos to my left then he busts out of them, runs by the feeder and into the swamp across the dirt road. I'm thinking, did he just run by to see if any corn was out yet? He looked like a nice boar in the 100 to 130lb range.
At 5:00pm the feeder goes off and about 15 minutes later i hear some hogs coming from the swampy area across the road. About 5 nice size meat hogs come running into the feeder. They are all about 80 to 100lbs and am a happy hunter. The first one that gives me an open shot I'm shooting. Then I hear more pigs and another 8 pigs come into the feeder and come over to where I am and start sucking up the corn. The problem is that there are to many and moving like crazy chomping the corn. most of the time they are facing the blind but when The turn broad side it seems there is alwaysa hog behind them too. I don't want to take a chance of shootingthrough one hog and hitting another even if it is a slim chance with my setup so i wait. They are nervousand have run off a few times but have come back each time. A big sow is causing problems biting the other hogs, she is about 140lbs so when she starts to turn broadside I'm ready... then she bolts for some reason. Well a deer was walking down the road and scared them. Well they come back after a minute and are all bunched up again.
At this point it is around 6:00pm with still plenty enough light to shoot but i figure i probably only have 15 minutes left at the most. Lucky for me the boar i saw earlier comes running in and jabs a buch of pigs and chases away the deer so he can have the corn for himself. He is at 15 yards with no pigs around him and starting to turn broadside and I am drawing at the same time.I'm at anchor just as he turns broadside, I pick the spot 1/3 up his body right up the leg and crack the arrow is in him about 1" to 2" above where I was looking. The boar takes off across the road to the swampy area with the other hogs. I was filming so i rewind thetape to see the shot and realize I shot the boar just before he would step into the frame so i have a good laugh but I can see the hog run off and the arrow looks good as far as placement and penetration. I get out of the blind and mark the trail the boar took and see blood.
About 15 minutes later it is dark and Hoppy comes to pick me up. I tell him the story and we decide to give my boar a little time and go pick up my friend. my friend Tommy scored on a nice big boar with his compound and made a perfect heart shot and the hog was down in 40 yards. we load up the hog into the pickup and head to my friend richies stand. Ricchie says he missed a big sow but shot a small hog and thinks he sw it go down in the grass. We walk over to where he thought it went down and there it is. He hit it too far back but got the main artery running along the back and the hog went down in 30 yards.
It isabout a hour now since i hit my hog so we start blood trailing with our flashlights. My hog is running based on the tracks but the bloodtrail is good. He is on a main trail so we are moving pretty fast and find my part of my arrow about 60 yards in a small clearing. I'm thinking the hog must have fallen here to break the arrow so where is he....and there he is about ten yards away by a palm tree. The arrow went thorough both lungs, a little high and penetrated through both shields and was sticking out the other side about two inches. yeas, the muzzy phamtoms and extreme foc came through. Unfortunately I didn't bring my digital camera and hoppy threw out his back helping me get him in thetruck so below is the only picture i have. I wanted to get another picture at the skinning shed but the other guide didn't realize it and had the hog quatered before I got there with my camera. Later tonight i will post about day two.
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/310.jpg)
:thumbsup: :clapper:
Glad things turned around for you.
Good times :thumbsup:
Glad dit worked out!Thanks for sharing.sounds like you had a great time in the end.
congrats that was an awesome hunt considering the bad start. :clapper:
:thumbsup: :thumbsup:
Great story. Sounds like a blast.
Ditto on Ryan's post. Good job
Good Story, :notworthy:
Good for you buddy...congrats! I miss Florida :(
Good stuff here Jeff! Thanks for the story. How about some bow info?
Wow !! Bacon for everyone !!!
I'm shooting a 55lb Palmer single carbon recurve with 55/75 goldtips with 50gr brass inserts and 200gr 2 blade muzzy phantoms.
Great story- i want to do that someday but I want to try to spot and stalk one....I have a sister that lives in florida and I want to drive my bike down there...maybe this summer.
I can take my bow and my flyrods....
Jer bear
:thumbsup:
:campfire: :clapper:
Looking good!
Which makes me wonder why I keep hearing about Florida boys headin' up to Georgia to hunt ?????
thats a lotta bbq :thumbsup:
Day 2
Up at 5 again and it is 26 degrees out this morning but will be sunny as well. Hoppy and pat come by at 6am and we decide who is going where. I'm going to spot and stalk with Hoppy and Tommy is going to tag along since he got a big sow the evening he arrived and then the nice boar last night. A couple of guysare going on stand and my friend Roger will go stalking with Pat. We ecide to drive way over to the other side of the ranch where Hoppy's father did a contreolled burn yesterday. This cold weather and wet conditions is perfect for them to finally burn down some brush after not being able to for a few years.
We head to the crooked oaks stand to see if the fire came through and burnt it up. Also we can stalk up to the feeder there. Well the stand was an oasis around the burn that was a few miles long. It was pretty cool that the brush was burned but the trees where fine. The hogs were close but were all small 40 pounders. We decide to go check out another stand to see if it made it too and it is by some oak trees the hogs are hitting. As we are driving there some nice 80lb meat hogs cross the road and we are in business.
The group consists of two nice big 90lbs sows a couple of shoats ( small boars ) and some sows with piglets. We play the wind and make a circle to get well ahead of them. As we are waiting we see one about 65 yards away heading through an area with some oaks and palmetto bunches but clear enough to stalk with some knee high grass. We got into the bunch of them but the sows with piglets were the only shots and I didn't wantto shoot them. Finally one of the small boars is turning broadside but one of the piglets is squeeling at me. So they move off slowly. We are playing cat and mouse now for another 100 yards since we can't let one of the hogs cut are wind while the group is holding back. It was a great time but frustrating. We have to hold back or we will get busted by a straggler so we let them get ahead and try to cut them off again.
One of the nice sows is hanging back now and we put a stalk on her as the others are feeding away. She passes into a small oak grove and is rooting and looking away. I put an oak tree to block me from her view and move 20 yards to cutthe distance down to 15 yards I can see her a little bit though some palmettos around the oak and she looks like she is till rooting away like she was 20 seconds ago since i lean out from the oak drawing my bow ...and she is now rooting looking right at me and picks up the movement and busts out of there! So close! It was a lot of fun though even though I didn't get a shot. Tommy had a real blast too since this was the first time he had done any spot and stalk.
All told the stalk was close to two hours and 400 yards. It was great. We head back to the ranch to see how the other guys did. Not much action because of the cold and know other pigs down.
More practice out back and we take aride to walmart to pick up a cooler. I think back to when we first came here in 2003 and jetblue let you bring 3 bags, 70lbs each for free. Now it is one bag 50lbs for free.
Around 3:30pm we head out for the evening hunt. Hoppy my friend Roger and I head to Hoppy's father in laws ranch that is about a 1/2 hour away. It isa cattle ranch that has a ton of turkeys, deer and some nice hogs usually. The hogs have been hitting hard his steer feeders and he wants us to knock down the population since the hogs are eating around $50 - $60 of cattle food each week. He tells Hoppy, now just don't shoot one of them get as many as you can. The steer feeders look like a small tanker truck without the cab. We climb up on the galvanized feedser and we are standing on a ledge that is on each side about 3 1/2 feet from the top and we are 10 feet off the ground. We are in a field about 125 yards from some reall thick stuff. As we are up ther we see some deer about 200 yards away...and one of them is a big 8 pt that would score in the high 120's or low 130's. What a beauty. Well around 4:00pm here come the hogs. Roger is one one side of the feeder and I am on the other. The steers are walking around so we have to be very careful with them since the bill would be big if we hit one of them. LOL One other thing, while the steers are feeding under us the tend to smack ther heads and horns to get more feed to fall down. This shakes the feeder like you can't believe and makes a loud gonnnnggggggg. The problem was that the hogs come straight in so who had no shot and you were skylighted to boot. Hoppy joked that next time we willwear galvanized camo. On a serious not next time i will wear light blue jeans and a white shirt though and that would definitely help. Well I want Roger to get a hog so i tell him he is up first. He is on the other side of the feeder and a nice big sow is coming in. Well she comes straight in and he has no shot. Now a group of 6 hogs is coming in so we are waiting for them to come in and start feeding. All this time the steers are banging the feeder about once a minute. The big sow is at theend of the feeder and I have a perfect slightly quartering away shot of 15 yards while the sow iswatching another group come walking in. I pass on the shot since i want Roger to get a hog. Sure enough the sow turns to come back in and Roger nails her perfectly. The hog turnsand runs for the thick stuff and we can see the blood pouring out of here. She makes it about 85 yards and that is it.
A little while later out comes a big group of hogs from the woods. A monster boar is there and he is over 200lbs with a head like a cinder block with tusks. Three more nice boars come out also in the 175lb range and a buch of nice hogs in the 100 to 150lb range. They are all fat on steer feed. Since they are so well fed they are in no rush to come in to feed but they come slowly none the less. As before they can see us skylighted but don't know what we are and are just cautious. Well I'm tryingto get a shot for 15 minutes and just couldn't get lucky. They always were facing me or a steer was in the way or spooking. Finally a nice sow starts walking to the other side of the feeder and I rush my shot and hit her a little to far back but she was quartering away. Well she runs and then starts to circle to go back to the thick stuff and i wasable to quickly get another arrow and hit her as she was moving at about 35 yards. The second shot is by the first and I can see she is hurt. She runs about 100 yards and beds down before she can get to the cover. I figure that it she is going to die right there. Well here comes one of the boars and tries to breed her, I hear he squel and she gets up and runs the 50 yards to thethick stuff on the mine trail.
By now it is getting dark fast. At this point we decide to give my sow a little time and check in with the other guys while it is dark now. I check my phone and I havea message from tommy and he got turned around as he waswalking out to the pick up point and is lost. Well we call him back and Hoppy talks him out to where Pat can pick him up. Tonight wasa good night and they have pigs down. At this point it has been about 45 minutes from when i hit my hog so we decide to get Rogers hog and then look for blood sign. Rogers shot was indeed perfect and I quickly find my hogs blood trail. I follow the trail to where she entered the thick stuff to mark it off for later and there she is, dead just inside thethick stuff right on the trail. I've seen thisa lot with hogs, it seems they will run a ll out to make it to cover and then die just inside cover like they relax and just die after pushing so hard. My shot was better then i thought and got liver and maybe one lung. I'll post pictures tonight when my internet service comes back on.
man, what a fun time!! sounds like an awesome place to hunt!! :clapper:
gaff
Now that sounds like a great hunt! Congrats!
Hmmmm. Take the kids to Disney and get in on a hog hunt! Sounds awesome!
What is the name of the ranch?
Mint, you're killing me. My buddies, my son, and I will be at Hoppy's place in a couple of weeks. We go down every year. I can hardly wait now after your stories. Great time, huh?
Dave, this year was just something else. I've been going every year since 2003 and we have always had a blast but this year pigs were everywhere and all good sized to boot. This year Pat and Hoppy set up ground blinds using a black fabric material. When i was wearing my black sweatshirt the pigs couldn't pick me up. He also set up a new stand since the potato beds stand is unusable since they are harvesting palm trees. The new stand has got some big pigs coming to it. Just ask him for the stand where Tommy got lost. LOL
Y'all eat chitlin's up there? :bigsmyl:
Here are the hogs we got off the steer feeder
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new039.jpg)
My friend Roger and his big sow
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new041.jpg)
And the sow I got.
Excellent bud! Congrats again :clapper:
Day 3
Up at five and out by six. Roger, Hoppy and I plan on going stalking and I am going to film roger. We head out to stalk up to feeder to see if we can get a hog or two. Well the hogs are there, a real nice boar and nice sow too. The sow is very nervous and for some reason bolts out of there before we can get a shot. Normally the boar would bolt too but this guy stayed around rooting. It was a 20 yard shot so Roger wanted to wait until he moved closer but it was not to be. The boar moved off before he could get a shot. We drive to another feeder to see ifthere is any activity and sure enough there are 3 hogs rooting around. This is a new feeder they just put in and don't have a stand or blind set up yet. There are plenty of palmettos around the feeder so we are able to get to 20 yards but there isn't a shot since it is thick. Roger and hoppy swing around to the rightto get a shot while I move forward with the camera to within 15 yards and the hogs are behind the palmattos under the feeder but it clear to the left and wouldn't you know it two of the hogs move to left and it is a clear shot. Roger is able to shoot over the palmattos though but he shoots high and has a complete miss. The hogs bust out of there and are gone. Here are some pictures that I got out stalking.
hog bed
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new001.jpg)
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new002.jpg)
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new004.jpg)
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new007.jpg)
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new006.jpg)
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new009.jpg)
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new034.jpg)
Thanks Curt, Florida hog hunting sure is fun.
Good job Mint. Finish arrow at 35 yards running. Now that's shootin bub. Did you guys put some chops on the grill?
Day 3 Evening
On the morning hunt my friend richie got another hog and my friend Eddie took a nice sow too. I don't have there pictures though.
They opt for stands since ther have been some nice boars coming into the stands while Roger is going to go stalking with pat and hoppy wants me to try out a new ground blind with him on the far side of the property in a field where they hunt deer.
There is a little oasis of a couple of oaks, a few palm trees and palmettos out in the middle of the field. Sure enough there are three nice hogs rooting around where they throw the corn out. We decide to push some cattle in the field over to them to scare them away so we can get set up. It works and we are hoping they will come back.
About an hour later a different group starts to come in across the field. They are all nice hogs in the 100lb range but one sow is pushing 140 - 150lbs. She is really fat. i'm shooting behind a blind made up of some black cloth and there is a over hanging oak as a canopy that stretches out over where the hogswill be feeding 10 to 15 yards away. The hogs come in and are nervous just moving all over the place and bunching up. I'm trying to draw but the are seeing me and bolting out of there. Unfortunately the over hanging aok is not keeping me from being skylighted and i tell hoppy he needs to put up so more cloth higher up just leaving a shooting window. He agrees and says don't I know i'm the guinea pig. we have a good laugh and the hogs are coming back in and i am crouched down and 5 yards back of the blind. The big sow finally turns broadside after 15 minutes and i rise up as I am drawing and I pick aspot right up the leg and shoot right over her giving her a haircut. I couldn't believe it since i was really burning a hole in her side but I guess my mind was so tricked by the blind and the over hanging oak branch that i thought the hog was farther away. I should have just aimed right at the spot since she was only ten yards away. I was humbled for sure.
That was it for hogs that night but it wasa great time. As we hear back we learn that tommy ended up getting a nice meat sow and my friend Eddie got another sow too.
4th day, last morning hunt since we have to leave at 12:00 noon.
I decide to hunt and so does Richie and Roger. They opt to go stalking with hoppy and they put me on the bird feeder stand hunting out of a ladder stand. it is called the bird feeder stand since a lot of cardinals come in to feed. This is the stand I got my first ever hog out of in 2003. A nice boar that i have a shoulder mount of in my home office.
Well this is a real thick area pretty close to camp that is just sea of palmettos other then the dirt road the feeder is on. The ladder stand is in a live oak tree and you are so blended in you can do jumping jacks in the stand and not get spotted. The stand is made from tubular aluminum and right off I have a problem with my camera and can't get it real secure with the bracket. I've got a new remote that has a six inch wire attaching it to the camera that is clipped to my jacket that i am trying out for the first time.
Well the feeder goes off at 7:00am and here come the hogs a short time later. First one, then two, then three and they keep coming out of the palmettos like you can't believe just going crazy on the corn. there are 15 of them and all about 100 lbs but there are two really nice sows. Well I am trying to get one to turn braodside while the camera is on the shot but the short cable of theremote keeps moving the camera or other hogs go behind the hog i want to shoot spoiling the shot.
At this point i take off the remote and just set up the camera shot on a pot and wait for hogs to come into the frame. Evertime one turns broadside and i start to draw they turn the other way since they are trying to get all the corn they can get. I figure i have to wait until the frenzy calms down and the corn starts getting less. About 10 minutes and the big sow turns broadside and i get the cmaera on her and then she turns slightly quartering away and I am at anchor pick a spot and the arrow hits exactly at the spot i was aiming at.
Unfortunately I went to deer hunting mode and hit her right behind the shoulder and not up the leg. I got good penetration and the the arrow was buried almost to the flethching. I hear them in the palmettos run off and then veer left to where some oaks are. It is so thick you cannot see them at all. I wait about 45 minutes and then walk back to camp to see if anyone can blood trail with me. Sure enough pat isther as well as my friend Tommy and eddie. I show them the shot on the TV and Pat wants to go right now but i convince him to give it another 1/2 hour just in case.
I start the blood trail and it isa good one but it is so thick we are following tunnels in the palmettos. She changes direction a few times and i know she must have travelled with the other group of hogs and this is whaT I was afraid of. Normally a hog with a hit like mine would bed down pretty quick and we would find her dead in her bed but when the follow another group the just keep going. We are about 75 yards in and we lose the trail for a minute but i find some drops after a little clearing on thetrail to the left. We go a little further and i find my arrow and it has a lot of blood but also some gut. Looks like i hit gut and liver. We move alittle more and i see three buzzards that were in a tree take off. We are at a knee high grassy are about a 20 yard circle that Pat says they bed in. We move casually just in case my hog might still be alive and ther she is on the other side of the small clearing....stone colddead in her bed. It seems the buzzards must have smelled her and were waiting in the trees to make sure. The hit did get gut but got liver to and she looks like she expired preety quick after she made itto the bed. Here is the picture at her bed and then after we dragged her out.
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new045.jpg)
(http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo137/jm9862/Hogs/new047.jpg)
Now the challenge was to get all the meat home. Lucky for me my friend eddie had some room in the coller and I had deboned the other hogs the previous day. I also carried everything back except my bow and arrow in my carryon so I could load up my other checked bag with the frozen shoulders of the previous hogs. Hope you enjoyed the story. I decided to post since i really enjoy rerading everyones else's hunt a longs.
"Good job Mint. Finish arrow at 35 yards running. Now that's shootin bub. Did you guys put some chops on the grill?"
Believe me, that was pure luck. No chops yet but I made the boar and the smaller sows front shoulders into andouille, hot italian and sweet italian sausage. Next saturday I'll be making a ham on the smoker.
:thumbsup: :thumbsup:
Great job, glad you hung in there. Appears it all turned out good. I can speak volumes about the airlines delays, glad it didn't ruin the hunt.
Thank you for "deciding to post".....that's what TG is all about my friend!
Congrats again :clapper:
See ya in August...
Mint I been going to Osceola Outfitters for about 12 years on and off , Great place to hunt, lots of game and just a great place to get rid of the northern blahhhs this time of year. I will be going down in February , hope all the hogs are still there :) Last time we were down the place was still infested with pigs.
Jack
Jack, they won't "all" be there. Jimmy and the rest of us will hopefully bring a few back home with us the week before you go :biglaugh:
Too deadly, fellows! A grand hunt!
Yeah Dave I know I'm not too worried about you guys but JW's group are devastating :)
I'm getting pumped up for the trip already.
Mint , great pictures and post brought me out of the winter slump :thumbsup:
Good luck Jack and Dave. This year there sure was a lot of really nice sized pigs coming in.
Looked like you had a great hunt, thanks for sharing.
Thanks, Mint, two weeks and counting down :jumper: